Letters to David
Irving on this Website

Unless
correspondents ask us not to, this Website
will post selected letters that it
receives, and invite open
debate.

Edward
Marr
asks,
Wednesday, November 21, 2007, for the low-down on
the Nazi assassination of Austrian chancellor
Engelbert Dollfuss in July 1934

Photo:
Benito Mussolini and friend, Engelbert
Dollfuss

What
was really Hitler's part in the 1934 murder of
Dollfuss?

I AM conducting my IB [International
Baccalaureat] History coursework on the events
surrounding the assassination of [Austrian
Chancellor Engelbert]
Dollfuss.

I am particularly intrigued by your argument
that the Führer had not ordered the murder of
the Chancellor, as seen from the brief entries in
the diary of Dr. Joseph Goebbels on the
dates surrounding this pivotal event in European
history. (http://www.fpp.co.uk/History/General/Dollfuss.html
). I would be fascinated to know whether there
is any other evidence to suggest that this was
indeed the case as I seem to be struggling to find
my way through an abundance of material implicating
the Fuhrer, or where I can find any more extensive
material.

Free
downloadof David Irving's booksBookmark
the download page to find the latest new
free books

David Irving
replies:

THE most important material is the memoirs of
Generaloberst Wilhelm Adam, unpublished, who
was with Hitler that evening. I use the manuscript
in my Hitler biography. The original, preserved for
many years after the war in a Bavarian monastery,
is now in the Institut für Zeitgeschichte
archives in Munich as file ED109/2, which allowed
me to read it exclusively many years ago. Check out
my descriptions in my biographies of Goebbels
and Hitler
and Hitler prewar (The
War Path). I was the first historian to get the
Joseph Goebbels Diaries on this episode.

HITLER
had begun to plot against his neighbour, Austria --
he mentioned it at lunch on July 10
[1934].[35]

Although
he would protest his innocence in later years,
there is no doubt that he was fully apprised of the
coup being prepared by Austrian Nazis under Theo
Habicht. Habicht claimed army backing for a
plot to replace the dictatorial chancellor Dr
Engelbert Dollfuss with Dr Anton
Rintelen, a prominent right-wing politician.

Goebbels'
unpublished diary shows that he considered Habicht
a hothead whom Hitler, as was typical of his
indecisiveness, was hanging on to far too long.
When Habicht brought the latest news on Austria on
April 10, Goebbels again decided: 'He's obviously
not up to the job.'[36] After discussing
Austria with Habicht and Haegert two weeks
later Goebbels noted: 'We'll be intervening there
more strongly now. Otherwise dilettantism
rules.'[37]

Intervene
-- but how? Attending Bayreuth for the annual
Wagner festival on Sunday July 22, he found Hitler
conferring secretly with Habicht, Rosenberg,
General Walther von Reichenau and the former
S.A. commander Franz Pfeffer von Salomon.
They had decided on a coup. In his diary Goebbels
inked the terse comment: 'Will it come off? I've
very sceptical.'[38] For three days they
went their normal ways: Hitler entertained Goebbels
and the others by reading from his Landsberg prison
notes, and talking of the past; once they all went
for a picnic in the forests. Back at the Wagner
household, Goebbels had a little scene with
Magda whom he caught 'snooping' through his
mail.

The
coup was to take place the next day, Wednesday July
25. General Wilhelm Adam, army commander in
Bavaria, was ordered to report at nine A.M. on
Wednesday morning to Bayreuth, where Hitler boasted
to him that the Austrian army was going to
overthrow the Dollfuss government that day: Adam
was to arm all the Austrian Nazis who had fled to
Germany. The army general was also deeply
sceptical.

Goebbels
was with Hitler as the first reports came in from
Vienna. Things were soon going badly wrong just as
he had feared: 'Big rumpus. Colossal tension. Awful
wait. I'm still sceptical. Pfeffer more optimistic.
Habicht too. Wait and see!'

The
word was that Habicht's Nazis had seized Dollfuss
and his minister of the interior Emil Fey in
a scuffle. Hitler put through endless phone calls
to Berlin, because lines to Vienna were dead. At
three P.M. he phoned General Adam: 'Everything is
going according to plan in Vienna,' he lied. 'The
government building is in our hands. Dollfuss has
been injured -- the rest of the news is confused as
yet. I'll phone again.'

He
never did; he and Goebbels listened to Wagner's
'Rhinegold' that afternoon with only half an ear.
Then came uglier news: Dollfuss had been shot dead,
and the rebels were pulling out. 'Habicht was all
talk,' decided an outraged Goebbels. 'I just manage
to suppress a crazy communiqué by Pfeffer.'

Pfeffer
and Habicht were very mute after this. Goebbels
switched the propaganda ministry over to emergency
damage control. The foreign ministry blamed the
German ambassador and recalled him. 'Führer
remains quite calm,' observed Goebbels. 'Casting
new plans. Dollfuss is out: that's a serious blow
to the Austrian regime.'

They
tore up their remaining Wagner tickets and returned
to Berlin the next day. Mussolini -- who had
secretly approved the idea of ousting Dollfuss --
was furious at the murder, and sent his army to the
Austrian frontier. The Italian press waded into the
Nazis. Goebbels ordered his press to hit back.
Hitler was angry that Mussolini had changed his
tune. 'It's all over with Italy,' Goebbels decided.
'The same old disloyalty. The Führer has
washed his hands of them.'

As
a bloodbath began in Austria, he persuaded Hitler
to dismiss the bungling, cynical dilettante Habicht
if not actually shoot him; Papen was sent as
special ambassador to Austria. Late on July 27
Hitler spoke to Goebbels about the future: 'He has
a prophetic vision,' wrote the minister. 'Germany
as master of the world. Job for a century.' The
assassins were publicly hanged in Vienna.